Green Hospitals, Green Healthcare

Concepts related to ‘green health’ and ‘green hospitals’ are rapidly changing and varying their scopes towards wider perspectives. Environmental health considers the natural, built and social environments, implying a better understanding of the way they impact on health, and accepting that the built environment plays an important role in it. On the one hand, impacts of building design, construction, operation and management of hospitals on environment and health are currently accepted. On the other hand, hospitals are complex systems, where changes are neither fast nor easily performed. In order to achieve a green healthcare system, a deep knowledge of its strengths and weaknesses is needed, as well as of the internal dynamics. According to this target, our research focuses on the identification of opportunities for improving the existing health facilities according to the new concepts related to green hospitals. We deal with the study of various aspects as the site and its environment, better access, efficient management of resources (particularly water and energy), waste reduction, use of renewable and low emission materials, as well as all factors in design that can improve the users’ wellness. Some decisions must be taken at the early phases of planning, design, and construction, while other can be reached when hospitals are already operating. In addition, some decisions affect the buildings and their sites (the ecological footprint of the facility), while other extend to the neighbouring communities (districts, and municipal infrastructures and services) in order to diminish the risks, and to protect natural resources. Decisions can even affect wider ranges (as supplies and purchasing, for instance) and can help the efficient management while reducing the environment degradation. The proposed case study is University Hospital Príncipe de Asturias in Alcalá de Henares

Evaluation of oxygen carriers based on manganese-iron mixed oxides prepared from natural ores or industrial waste products for chemical looping processes

Manganese-iron mixed oxides have been identified as promising oxygen carrier materials in chemical looping processes. In this work, low-cost raw materials are considered for the production of this type of oxygen carrier. Four manganese based minerals from deposits of different locations – South Africa, Gabon(x2) and Brazil – and two iron based materials (Fe-ore from Spain and Redmud waste) were used to prepare suitable oxygen carriers through a new two-step production method: a mixing-grinding (about 5 µm) pre-treatment followed by pelletizing, crushing and sieving to produce particles of the desired size (100–300 µm). This method was required in order to form the MnFe mixed oxide and to provide permanent magnetic properties, which were not found when the oxygen carriers were prepared by the classical one-step method, i.e. crushing and sieving of raw materials to the desired particle size (100–300 µm). The oxygen uncoupling capability of the developed materials was extremely low and even completely lost after repeated redox cycles. However, they were reactive under chemical looping conditions with H2, CO and CH4. Reactivity varied with the raw materials used and with the redox cycles, being of crucial importance for its evolution the intensity of the chemical stress during hundreds of redox cycles. © 2022 The Author

Waste-to-fuel opportunities for British quick service restaurants: A case study

The fast food supply chain is facing increasing operating costs due to volatile food and energy prices. Based on a case study of a major fast food logistics operator, this paper quantifies the potential for fuel generation from the waste generated by quick-service restaurants in Britain. Several fuel pathways and supply chains were mapped to understand the carbon intensity of the various waste-to-fuel opportunities, the number of heavy goods vehicles that might be powered and the key factors that could help companies make better informed decisions related to fuel generation from waste. The research suggested that depending on the scenarios considered, between 13.9 and 17.2 million GJ of energy could be obtained from fuels made from the waste arisings of British quick service restaurants and their distribution centres (DCs), representing between 4.4 and 5.8% of the national energy consumption from heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) and well-to-wheel (WTW) greenhouse gases (GHG) savings of between 652 and 898 thousand tonnes of CO2 equivalent annually. Used cooking oil and burger fat arising from British quick-service restaurants could generate enough energy to power up to 3891 HGVs with FAME diesel (B100), 1622 with HVO diesel (B100) or 1943 with biomethane annually. The paper and card generated by these same establishments could also power an additional 4623 biomethane vehicles, wood pallets could power an additional 73 bioethanol trucks and plastics could also power 341 vehicles running with synthetic diesel. The results showed that collections of separate waste fractions by logistics operators could make a relevant contribution towards the decarbonisation of the supply chain while reducing disposal fees and fuel costs. The carbon emissions resulting from this approach depend greatly on the footprint of the collection and transportation systems used to move waste from the restaurants to the processing plants and return the converted fuel back to the distribution centres where the vehicles are refuelled. Logistics firms are in a privileged position to manage these flows as they can use empty back-haul trips to collect and consolidate waste in distribution centres

Incidence of Phytophthora Fruit Rot on Four Durian Cultivars in Davao City, Philippines

A two-year study was conducted in a farm in Davao City, Philippines, to investigate the incidence of Phytophthora fruit rot on four commercial durian (Durio zibethinus Murr.) cultivars previously laboratory-tested for their reaction to the disease using isolates of the pathogen, Phytophthora palmivora Butler. In year 1, disease incidence was highest on cultivars Alcon Fancy and Arancillo at 10.7% and 9.9%, respectively. Lesser infection was observed on cultivar Puyat (0.5%) and no infection was recorded for cultivar Seri Kembangan. The same trend was obtained in year 2, further confirming previous laboratory infection test results. Incidence on Alcon Fancy was 47.3%, followed by Arancillo (25.92%), Puyat (12.6%), and Seri Kembangan (2.1%). In monetary terms, the year 1 total of 545 infected fruits is equivalent to a potential income loss of PhP27,250.00, with PhP2900.00, PhP2697.00 and PhP204.38, respectively, coming from the three cultivars. In year 2, the total of 1233 total infected fruits translates to a potential income loss of PhP49,320.00. To this figure, Alcon Fancy cultivar with the highest infection (47.3%) contributed PhP21,873.34, followed by Arancillo (25.9%) with PhP15,967.35. Puyat at 12.9% infection shared about PhP11,925.00 and Seri Kembangan at 2.1% added an equivalent of PhP1294.65. Result of the study indicate that more disease management interventions will have to be exerted for the more susceptible but more commercially preferred cultivars. Several fruit nursery operators in Davao City expressed that propagating Alcon Fancy and Arancillo seedlings is no longer profitable since knowlegeable farmers do not patronize them anymore, citing high susceptibility to Phytophthora diseases as the primary reason

Significance of the compliance of the joints on the dynamic slip resistance of a bioinspired hoof

Robust mechanisms for slip resistance are an open challenge in legged locomotion. Animals such as goats show impressive ability to resist slippage on cliffs. It is not fully known what attributes in their body determine this ability. Studying the slip resistance dynamics of the goat may offer insight toward the biologically inspired design of robotic hooves. This article tests how the embodiment of the hoof contributes to solving the problem of slip resistance. We ran numerical simulations and experiments using a passive robotic goat hoof for different compliance levels of its three joints. We established that compliant yaw and pitch and stiff roll can increase the energy required to slide the hoof by ≈ 20% compared to the baseline (stiff hoof). Compliant roll and pitch allow the robotic hoof to adapt to the irregularities of the terrain. This produces an antilock braking system-like behavior of the robotic hoof for slip resistance. Therefore, the pastern and coffin joints have a substantial effect on the slip resistance of the robotic hoof, while the fetlock joint has the lowest contribution. These shed insights into how robotic hooves can be used to autonomously improve slip resistance

Quantum group symmetry of the Quantum Hall effect on the non-flat surfaces

After showing that the magnetic translation operators are not the symmetries of the QHE on non-flat surfaces , we show that there exist another set of operators which leads to the quantum group symmetries for some of these surfaces . As a first example we show that the $su(2)$ symmetry of the QHE on sphere leads to $su_q(2)$ algebra in the equator . We explain this result by a contraction of $su(2)$ . Secondly , with the help of the symmetry operators of QHE on the Pioncare upper half plane , we will show that the ground state wave functions form a representation of the $su_q(2)$ algebra .Comment: 8 pages,latex,no figur

A State-Dependent Damping Method to Reduce Collision Force and Its Variability

This paper investigates the effect of biologically inspired angle-dependent damping profile in a robotic joint primarily on the magnitude and the variability of the peak collision force. Joints such as the knee that experience collision forces are known to have an angle-dependent damping profile. In this paper, we have quantified and compared three damping profiles. Our numerical and experimental results show that the proposed hyperbolic angle-dependent damping profile can minimize both the magnitude and the variability of the peak collision force(average magnitude and variability reduction of 26% and 47% compared to the peak constant damping profile). Very often, the variability of the force across the collision between the robot and the environment cause uncertainty about the state variables of the robotic joint. We show that by increasing the slope of the proposed hyperbolic angle-dependent damping profile, we can also reduce the variability and the magnitude of post-collision peak displacement and peak velocity compared to those of constant damping profile. This was achieved while reducing the mean root square of power consumed by the robotic joint